IX. DECADENCE
How a nation may die-Xerxes-A paragraph of murders-Artaxerxes II—Cyrus the Younger—Darius the Little—Causes of decay: political, military, moral—Alexander conquers Persia, and advances upon India
The empire of Darius lasted hardly a century. The moral as well as the physical backbone of Persia was broken by Marathon, Salamis and Plataea; the emperors exchanged Mars for Venus, and the nation descended into corruption and apathy. The decline of Persia anticipated almost in detail the decline of Rome: immorality and degeneration among the people accompanied violence and negligence on the throne. The Persians, like the Medes before them, passed from stoicism to epicureanism in a few generations. Eating became the principal occupation of the aristocracy: these men who had once made it a rule to eat but once a day now interpreted the rule to allow them one meal—prolonged from noon to night; they stocked their larders with a thousand delicacies, and often served entire animals to their guests; they stuffed themselves with rich rare meats, and spent their genius upon new sauces and desserts.140a A corrupt and corrupting multitude of menials filled the houses of the wealthy, while drunkenness became the common vice of every class.140b Cyrus and Darius created Persia, Xerxes inherited it, his successors destroyed it.
Xerxes I was every inch a king—externally; tall and vigorous, he was by royal consent the handsomest man in his empire.141 But there was never yet a handsome man who was not vain, nor any physically vain man whom some woman has not led by the nose. Xerxes was divided by many mistresses, and became for his people an exemplar of sensuality. His defeat at Salamis was in the nature of things; for he was great only in his love of magnitude, not in his capacity to rise to a crisis or to be in fact and need a king. After twenty years of sexual intrigue and administrative indolence he was murdered by a courtier, Artabanus, and was buried with regal pomp and general satisfaction.
Only the records of Rome after Tiberius could rival in bloodiness the royal annals of Persia. The murderer of Xerxes was murdered by Artaxerxes I, who, after a long reign, was succeeded by Xerxes II, who was murdered a few weeks later by his half-brother Sogdianus, who was murdered six months later by Darius II, who suppressed the revolt of Terituchmes by having him slain, his wife cut into pieces, and his mother, brothers and sisters buried alive. Darius II was followed by his son Artaxerxes II, who at the battle of Cunaxa, had to fight to the death his own brother, the younger Cyrus, when the youth tried to seize the royal power. Artaxerxes II enjoyed a long reign, killed his son Darius for conspiracy, and died of a broken heart on finding that another son, Ochus, was planning to assassinate him. Ochus ruled for twenty years, and was poisoned by his general Bagoas. This iron-livered Warwick placed Arses, son of Ochus, on the throne, assassinated Arses’ brothers to make Arses secure, then assassinated Arses and his infant children, and gave the sceptre to Codomannus, a safely effeminate friend. Codomannus reigned for eight years under the name of Darius III, and died in battle against Alexander at Arbela, in the final ruin of his country. Not even the democracies of our time have known such indiscriminate leadership.
It is in the nature of an empire to disintegrate soon, for the energy that created it disappears from those who inherit it, at the very time that its subject peoples are gathering strength to fight for their lost liberty. Nor is it natural that nations diverse in language, religion, morals and traditions should long remain united; there is nothing organic in such a union, and compulsion must repeatedly be applied to maintain the artificial bond. In its two hundred years of empire Persia did nothing to lessen this heterogeneity, these centrifugal forces; she was content to rule a mob of nations, and never thought of making them into a state. Year by year the union became more difficult to preserve. As the vigor of the emperors relaxed, the boldness and ambition of the satraps grew; they purchased or intimidated the generals and secretaries who were supposed to share and limit their power, they arbitrarily enlarged their armies and revenues, and engaged in recurrent plots against the king. The frequency of revolt and war exhausted the vitality of little Persia; the braver stocks were slaughtered in battle after battle, until none but the cautious survived; and when these were conscripted to face Alexander they proved to be cowards almost to a man. No improvements had been made in the training or equipment of the troops, or in the tactics of the generals; these blundered childishly against Alexander, while their disorderly ranks, armed mostly with darts, proved to be mere targets for the long spears and solid phalanxes of the Macedonians.142 Alexander frolicked, but only after the battle was won; the Persian leaders brought their concubines with them, and had no ambition for war. The only real soldiers in the Persian army were the Greeks.
From the day when Xerxes turned back defeated from Salamis, it became evident that Greece would one day challenge the empire. Persia controlled one end of the great trade route that bound western Asia with the Mediterranean, Greece controlled the other; and the ancient acquisitiveness and ambition of men made such a situation provocative of war. As soon as Greece found a master who could give her unity, she would attack.
Alexander crossed the Hellespont without opposition, having what seemed to Asia a negligible force of 30,000 footmen and 5,000 cavalry.* A Persian army of 40,000 troops tried to stop him at the Granicus; the Greeks lost 115 men, the Persians 20,000.144Alexander marched south and east, taking cities and receiving surrenders for a year. Meanwhile Darius III gathered a horde of 600,000 soldiers and adventurers; five days were required to march them over a bridge of boats across the Euphrates; six hundred mules and three hundred camels were needed to carry the royal purse.145 When the two armies met at Issus Alexander had no more than 30,000 followers; but Darius, with all the stupidity that destiny could require, had chosen a field in which only a small part of his multitude could fight at one time. When the slaughter was over the Macedonians had lost some 450, the Persians 110,000 men, most of these being slain in wild retreat; Alexander, in reckless pursuit, crossed a stream on a bridge of Persian corpses.146 Darius fled ignominiously, abandoning his mother, a wife, two daughters, his chariot, and his luxuriously appointed tent. Alexander treated the Persian ladies with a chivalry that surprised the Greek historians, contenting himself with marrying one of the daughters. If we may believe Quintus Curtius, the mother of Darius became so fond of Alexander that after his death she put an end to her own life by voluntary starvation.147
The young conqueror turned aside now with what seemed foolhardy leisureliness to establish his control over all of western Asia; he did not wish to advance farther without organizing his conquests and building a secure line of communications. The citizens of Babylon, like those ofJerusalem, came out en masse to welcome him, offering him their city and their gold; he accepted these graciously, and pleased them by restoring the temples which the unwise Xerxes had destroyed. Darius sent him a proposal of peace, saying that he would give Alexander ten thousand talents* for the safe return of his mother, his wife and his children, would offer him his daughter in marriage, and would acknowledge his sovereignty over all Asia west of the Euphrates, if only Alexander would end the war and become his friend. Parmenio, second in command among the Greeks, said that if he were Alexander he would be glad to accept such happy terms, and avoid with honor the hazard of some disastrous defeat. Alexander remarked that he would do likewise—if he were Parmenio. Being Alexander, he answered Darius that his offer meant nothing, since he, Alexander, already possessed such parts of Asia as Darius proposed to cede to him, and could marry the daughter of the emperor when he pleased. Darius, despairing of peace with so reckless a logician, turned unwillingly to the task of collecting another and larger force.
Meanwhile Alexander had taken Tyre, and annexed Egypt; now he marched back across the great empire, straight to its distant capitals. In twenty days from Babylon his army reached Susa, and took it without resistance; thence it advanced so quickly to Persepolis that the guards of the royal treasury had no time to secrete its funds. There Alexander committed one of the most unworthy acts of his incredible career: against the counsel of Parmenio, and (we are told) to please the courtesan Thaïs,† he burned the palaces of Persepolis to the ground, and permitted his troops to loot the city. Then, having raised the spirits of his army with booty and gifts, he turned north to meet Darius for the last time.
Darius had gathered, chiefly from his eastern provinces, a new army of a million men148—Persians, Medes, Babylonians, Syrians, Armenians, Cappadocians, Bactrians, Sogdians, Arachosians, Sacæ and Hindus—and had equipped them no longer with bows and arrows, but with javelins, spears, shields, horses, elephants, and scythe-wielding chariots intended to mow down the enemy like wheat; with this vast force old Asia would make one more effort to preserve itself from adolescent Europe. Alexander, with 7,000 cavalry and 40,000 infantry, met the motley mob atGaugamela,* and by superior weapons, generalship and courage destroyed it in a day. Darius again chose the better part of valor, but his generals, disgusted with this second flight, murdered him in his tent. Alexander put to death such of the assassins as he could find, sent the body of Darius in state to Persepolis, and ordered it to be buried in the manner of the Achæmenid kings. The Persian people flocked readily to the standard of the conquerer, charmed by his generosity and his youth. Alexander organized Persia into a province of the Macedonian Empire, left a strong garrison to guard it, and marched on to India.